The Evolution of Music Accessibility

This podcast is about the evolution of music accessibility described through three interviews conducted with my (1982) mother (1954), sister (1972), and brother (1983). The interviews begin with memories of my mother telling me stories about her records; the memories of listening to music in my sister's car; the memories my brother and I shared when music became available over the internet. Music accessibility goes hand-in-hand with technology and it is apparent that in a few short decades from my mother's generation to my own, technology became faster and music became easier to get thus creating turmoil within the music industry. Despite technology and music license limitations, people are able to choose their favorite way to get and listen to music. The demand for music will always be present and as long as their is a desire for music, there will be people willing to find a new way to get it be it experiencing records or mP3s for the first time or discovering a yet to be invented way.

Evolution of Music Accessibility by Lx on Mixcloud

A Familiar Sound: Making sense of Tame Impala, Fleet Foxes, and the suprising revival of 60's and 70's influenced rock

           

During the last decade, there has been an emergence of independent rock bands that have adopted eerily similar sounds to bands of the 1960’s and 70’s.  The music featured throughout the podcast is by current artists that embody this nostalgic sound and the two bands analyzed during the piece are Fleet Foxes, a band from Seattle that plays predominantly folk-rock and Tame Impala, a psychedelic rock band from Australia.  The intrigue of this reversion to heavily influenced music of the proclaimed ‘golden era’ of rock is the question of why these young musicians have established a sound that so closely channels their predecessors.  Has it been caused by something as simple as a preference for this sound? Or can it be attributed to the advances in technology and the amount of both new and archival music that we are able to easily access? A Familiar Sound delves into these potential influences on the revival of classic sounding rock music and provides examples of this current yet nostalgic sounding music in independent rock, a surprising and thought provoking trend. 

Music Featured during podcast in order of appearance: 

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti- "Baby"

Real Estate - "Kinder Blumen"

Fleet Foxes- "He Doesn't KnowWhy"     

Tame Impala- "Be Above It" (Intro, record player rip)

Tame Impala- "Apocalypse Dreams" 

Tame Impala- " Feel Like We Only Go Backwards"

Girls- "Lust For Life"  

A Day to Remember and Post-Hardcore Fans

A Day to Remember is a post-hardcore band formerly under Victory Records. They formed in 2003 in Ocala, Florida. Due to a lawsuit and trouble with Victory Records’ owner they released their latest album independently. I wanted to look at what caused their fallout with Victory Records, and how their fan base enabled them to still release the album independently through technology and social media. I also wanted to look at some of the techniques used in popular post-hardcore music that I feel make their fan bases so dedicated.

The Seductive Force of the Record Store

I chose to review a podcast produced by Sounding Out called "The Record Shop".  This was released in celebration of record store day 2012.  The podcast on a technically level was not sleek, or finely edited in any way whatsoever, though that is totally fine by me.  The content was clearly the focus for this collection of pleasing anecdotes about the physical experience of the record hunt, not to mention the sensations received.

I deeply empathized with the podcast as I still find the experience of cruising around a record store, sifting through endless piles of dust, incredibly therapeutic.  Some of the people interviewed confessed that a lot of the time when they proceed on the journey to their local music shack they aren't even intending to purchase anything.  It is all about meeting cool people, being hazed by the employees, and drooling upon the bin labels.

Knowing that humans are willing to make the effort to transport themselves to a record store, even though they could easily obtain the music for free, or order it online for a discounted price makes me feel really good.  It means that people have realized that the experience is just as, if not more important than the object.  What you leave with at the end of your visit to the record store is truly the least significant portion of the overwhelming experience of discovering new music and freaks from similar spheres.

Radiolab's "Pop Music"

Radiolab's podcast, Pop Music*, is about songs - why some invade our mind, how someone creates a catchy tune, music that transcends stereotypical cultures, and the way tunes are recognizable to a worldwide audience even if there is no clear “original” artist. The podcast claims a song’s melody that stays in our head is vague one typically only one part or piece of the song is remembered over and over again; this happens to me quite often especially if it is a Gwen Stefani song.

   

Sometimes, for me, the song I have in head playing ad nauseam will not go away completely until I listen to the song from start to finish, but sometimes it takes a little more than that like maybe listening to something else for a while or simply turning my brain off. Sadly, this is not the case for some people.

For one man, Leo Rangell, the music does not stop no matter what he does, is doing, or where he is going. Leo began having music hallucinations after he woke up from surgery and has had music hallucinations ever since, more than a decade now. When Leo has a song in his head, it is often reflective of a memory that is maybe not fully known but is recalled once a certain piece of the song plays; however, there are times when a part of his memory recalls a situation, like driving home, and a song, suitable for Leo, will play in his head.

Both comforting to some and nerve racking for others, music hallucinations specific to the songs people hallucinate are subjective for each listener, meaning what Leo would hear and what I would hear would most likely be two very different things. After all, Leo probably wouldn’t hallucinate Gwen Stefani but it is possible that I might hear “When Johnny Comes Marching Home.”  Why? I speculate it is because I have heard both songs before.

Songs are more than the lyrics. Personally, the melody is more important. I have heard some songs that have terrible lyrics but the melody is simply fantastic. Perhaps it is because I cannot sing but I can hum to my heart’s desire and someone can turn and say, “Hey, I love that song!” This podcast raised me to ask: “Well, what song do you think it is?”

This podcast demonstrated that one melody can fit many different songs and sometimes those different songs can be overlayed with one another and there is hardly a difference. With these minute differences in song tunes, it is evident that many different cultures could communicate over these similarities if they could communicate about little else. Thankfully, technology is able to illustrate comparable works for other to hear. How else might someone listen to The Elvis of Afghanistan, Ahmad Zahir?

The podcast’s was done in a manner that is reminiscent of motion pictures in that the music does not overpower the commentary but instead strengthens what is said. The interplay between the two is familiar to me yet discomforting if I am the one to do it; however, a podcast is a personal reflection on a particular subject and this is something that Radiolab exhibits well and is something I would like to emulate. Yet, I would forgo the sudden jumps from one subject to the next and concentrate on making something close to a concept album where the podcast tells a story, not necessarily linear, but something that does not feel like the podcast should be separate tracks.

The podcast intertwines point-of-view and concrete, scientific evidence. It is almost as if someone asks why the sky is blue and gives both opinion and objective evaluation providing stories on different sides of the same coin.

Perhaps this podcast is less about how a song gets stuck in our head, which to me conveys a negative connotation, but rather how music stays in our head, how music communicates strongly to us regardless of culture or nationality, and how music can be with us even when we are alone.

*For more on this Radiolab's podcast, please visit http://www.radiolab.org/story/91629-pop-music/ 

 

The Record Store

The podcast that I selected to listen to was Sounding Out! Episode #6: Spaces of Listening/The record Shop.  I have written a feature story about the resurgence of record stores over the past several years so I was immediately drawn to the topic to hear what the contributors in the podcast had to say about the current state of the record store.  After listening to the piece I have developed some conclusions on what it was about.  I believe that it is mainly about those featured in the story (record store owners, patrons, academics, musicians etc.) telling their favorite stories about growing up going to record stores and how that shaped their music taste by being suggested different pieces of music, hearing the music in the store or even just stumbling upon a physical copy while in the store that appeared to be intruiging that they eventually bought.  They touch upon the ritual of the moment of exchange in the record store i.e. exchanging money for something physical tangible, a vinyl record or CD.  This is something that for those that do not collect physical copies of music, especially in my genereation, do not experience, which truly makes a piece of music that much more special to an individual.

It can be inferred that those featured in the podcast are of an older generation when everyone went to the record store and that is where they discovered new music primarily.  Something that is stated by several of the contributors is that today with the disconnect that the internet has brought to the music industry and music culture, the younger generation is perhaps missing out on a large part of their music development because they are not going to record stores and asking the clerk or store owner what they suggest or even debate against their taste.  In part I think this argument is true.  Although I collect vinyl myself, I generally have an idea of what I am going to buy before I go into the store because it is something I have discovered and believe that it will sound good on vinyl, I almsot have never asked the record store clerk a music specific question I mostly just ask them if they have the record I am looking for.

As for the podcast itself and the production elements implemented, the structure was very effective and the plethora of contributors made it extremely intruiging because you were not hearing the same voice the entire time.  One particular element that I doubt was intentional but provoked my thoughts was that I was very drawn to the song that played at the beginning and end of the podcast but the song was never identified by the main narrator or in the description of the podcast.  I thought that related nicely to what a lot of the people in the podcast were talking about when they were in a record store and heard something playing and were drawn to the sound and asked the clerk, hey what is that? There is such an information overload on the internet that even though we can find almost any recorded music ever, it is not as authentic as hearing something in a physical space, it feels much more processed.  If this were my podcast I would have probably included more music throughout the piece perhaps as an example of the sounds that the contributors in the podcast remember hearing in the record store.  Other than that it was very well executed and engaging, bringing to attention a topic that I am incredibly drawn to.

All in the Mind - Hearing Voices

The podcast episode of All In the Mind titled “Hearing Voices – The Invisible Intruders,” presented by Lynne Malcolm, discusses the phenomena of hearing voices when no one is around speaking. Often categorized as an auditory hallucination, this phenomena raises questions of where these voices come from, why they are heard, and whether or not they can be considered “real.”

There is a great deal of stigma both cultural and historical associated with hearing of voices, both positive and negative. In the Western world, the hearing of voices that seem to come from outside of one’s head is linked to prophets and religious icons, and was generally seen as the mark of a holy figure, full of knowledge and power. Still today, others link the hearing of voices with a positive, spiritual experience, relating to God or some higher power. But more often than not, like the experiences with the voices themselves, the association is negative. There are countless stories of people feeling compelled to either harm themselves or others because voices told them to do so, to the point where it’s become a stereotype of “crazy” characters in popular media. The immediate association with someone who hears voices is that of someone violent, shut-in, delusional and often, beyond hope. But of course, there’s a lot more to it.

In addition to presenting recent scientific studies made on the topic of hearing voices, the podcast provides interviews with several people who claim to hear voices and who have struggled with it. While some describe pleasant experiences with voices, most often they are malicious. One woman describes the voices as coming from outside and into her own head, telling her things about what is happening around her, such as warning her that someone is about to attack or telling her to jump off of a bridge. Conversely, for another man, the voices are like echoes of people he has known returning to haunt him, like a priest who sexually abused him in childhood or a former lover who committed suicide. Some scientists believe that these phenomena of voices are not unlike phantom limb syndrome, in which the brain—deprived of sensory input due to a loss of tissue—will imagine or recall that sensory input from memory, giving the feeling that the limb still exists. These voices may exist in a similar manner, a brain falsely recalling memories of sounds when no one is around to cause them.

The cause of this is unclear. Because the human brain is a complex organ that we have very little understanding of still, there is a variety of potential sources: childhood trauma, chemical imbalance, all of which are too vague to really offer any specific diagnostics, much less actual solutions.

However, those interviewed in the podcast attest to the positive results of sharing their hearing experiences. The international Hearing Voices Network is a strong advocate of the idea that acceptance of the voices as real experiences—instead of unreal phenomena meant only to be ignored—gives those who suffer from such experiences a sense of power and greater ability to cope with their voices. Some even come to find their voices more enjoyable—one man discusses “the teacher,” a voice he consults when he has difficult decisions to make, claiming it is not all that different from the sort of dialogue people have with themselves in their own heads. People share coping mechanisms and find others who share in a phenomena that most other people would struggle to relate to, and may even be frightened by. The power of sharing the experience of hearing and categorizing it as a real experience helps normalize the experience, helping people to feel less alone more in control of themselves.

The podcast itself is nicely put together, providing a range of interview subjects from acclaimed scientists in the field to everyday people who experience the phenomena, and is punctuated by poetry written by and about someone who hears voices. I think it could have been made more powerful if it had included a section where a series of unrelated, often degrading voices, begin to talk over the podcast, to give the listener a sense of what that experience is like. This could even be done multiple times, before the podcast reaches the point where it discusses the Hearing Voices Network and its positive techniques. Still, the episode was well put together, interesting, with a positive outlook and a lot left to wonder about the nature of what is real and what isn’t.

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/allinthemind/hearing-voices---the-invisible-intruders/3321982